

When I think of the name Atari, I remember my mom sitting me down in the living room to show me “what video games were like” when she was a kid. That, and I think of Wade Watts using his extensive knowledge of Atari games to save the world in Ready Player One. So when I decided to check out some new games being published by the video game godfather, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Of the titles I played, the variety of both their art styles and genres was surprising. From turn-based roguelikes to remakes of Atari classics, there were three games that really caught my eye. First, we have the upcoming title Days of Doom, developed by SneakyBox. This whimsical post-apocalyptic turn-based strategy game will have you trying to get your crew of survivors to Sanctuary. Along the way, you’ll face zombies, raiders and monsters as you scavenge for resources. The real fun of this game comes in setting up each of your character’s unique abilities to combo off each other during their turn in combat. It was satisfying to cover enemies in oil with the pyromancer before setting them on fire with the gunslinger. Each run felt unique due to the procedurally generated levels and over 50 randomly occurring events. In between runs, you use the resources you gathered to upgrade your base camp, giving an overall feeling of progress as you fight to make it to Sanctuary. Days of Doom is an original IP for Atari which was initially envisioned as a mobile game before being brought to life for major platforms by SneakyBox. In the post-apocalyptic realm of games, the whimsical lightheartedness felt refreshing. The game follows the Atari formula; easy to pick up, hard to master. While turn-based strategy games can sometimes feel overwhelming, Days of Doom does a fantastic job at lowering the bar for entry while still keeping a high level of depth required if you hope to continuously guide your survivors to Sanctuary.